I am a writer. Writers play with words. (Yeah, writers are boring).
For excitement, writers aim for ways to say things in fewer words.
If you can tell a message in 500 words, can you do it in 200? Or 100? How about 50? Or 5?
What about the story of the Bible? Is there a way to tell it in 100 words? What about one single word?
You could say the Bible is about “Jesus.” That’s a correct answer for most questions asked in Bible school, right? Or you could say “Salvation” or “Redemption.” God’s story is about how He saved, or redeemed, humanity.
For a single-word summary of the Bible, how about… The Seed (Okay, that was two words.) “Seed” is a loaded word that says so much about the Bible. Let’s take a look.
The Seed Family
The Seed speaks to a line of humanity that runs for 4,000 years, from Eden to Bethlehem.
Like a seed that grows to become a tree and produces fruit of its kind, from the seed of Adam came another seed… from which came another seed… from which came another seed… and so on.
The Seed speaks to over 60 families—from the 1st Adam in a garden, to the 2nd Adam in a manger.
The Seed speaks to Eve, the mother of the living, the mother of the Seed.
The Seed speaks to a son named Seth, and to faith legends like Enoch and Methuselah, Lamech and Noah.
The Seed speaks to familiar names like Terah and Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Judah.
The Seed speaks to lesser familiar names like Nahshon, and Salmon, and Boaz, Obed and Jesse.
The Seed speaks to King David and King Solomon, and a host of kings that followed.
The Seed speaks to faithful men like Zerrubabbel, and Joseph, Mary’s husband.
The Seed speaks to a virgin mother, impregnated by a Holy Spirit “Seed.”
The Seed Journey
From Eden to Bethlehem, God routed the Seed through and around various trouble spots to keep the Seed alive.
The Seed speaks to:
protection from a global flood (Noah),
birth of a mighty nation (Abraham),
escape from famine (Joseph),
deliverance from slavery (Moses),
blessing as a thriving kingdom (David),
rescue from a nation’s exile (Zerrubabbel),
detour away from the annihilation of baby boys (Joseph).
The Seed Strategy
The Bible is about God’s grand plan, His overall strategy to redeem creation. God used the Seed of the woman to defeat the seed of the serpent (see Genesis 3:15).
So what exactly was this strategy?
After 4,000 years, this Seed would one day appear from heaven as a newborn baby, grow up, and walk the earth as a sinless man, and then die a brutal death on a cross.
It’s a wild story, actually.
The Seed speaks to a human sacrifice to God. The Lamb of God. The Passover Lamb. The forever atonement for sin.
The Seed speaks to an amazing resurrection event, when the Seed returns from death to earth… and then to heaven again.
The Seed speaks to a day in the future still, when a mighty battle is fought, the enemy is finally crushed, and death is swallowed forever.
The Seed speaks to a new kingdom, a forever kingdom, reigning over the new heavens and the new earth.
The Bible is about…. The Seed.
Join us in 2019, as we Power Read Bible in 60 days. Bible readers all over the world are finding success with this Power Reading journey and have found the Seed to be a helpful clarifying focus for understanding and enjoying the Bible.
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